One of principal problems facing telephone companies, is the difficulty of increasing the number of telecommunication network circuits without increasing the size of the terminating and switch facilities. Economy of space is very important.
Additionally maintaining versatility and the ability to test, monitor and patch cross-connect circuits is also important. With more and more switching being done electronically, the consequences of equipment failure becomes more serious. If a single electronic switching network fails, thousands of telecommunication circuits may be interrupted and adversely affected. Consequently there is a need to provide manual test, monitor and patch cross-connecting capability to the network circuits, while at the same time reducing the cost and panel space required to provide such functions.
At the present time, Augat Communications Group Inc. of Bellevue, Wash., provides a digital interface cross-connect panel called "DS-1 CROSS-CONNECT/TEST ACCESS PANEL" or "DSX TAP" that is designed to terminate, cross-connect and provide serial and bridged test access to one hundred sixty-eight four-wire digital equipment ports for mounting on a standard 23-inch rack shelf within a vertical space of less than six inches of vertical space on the rack shelf. To obtain test access to a circuit, the DSX TAP panel utilizes two rows of 42 special card connector blocks each capable of receiving a special "access jack card" having a test card that leads to two bantam jacks mounted on the front of the panel. Each front connector has four sets of make-before-brake contacts. The four contacts of the right side of each connector is electrically connected to corresponding multiplexer equipment pins on the upper rear of the panel. The contacts on the left side of each connector are electrically connected to the corresponding multiplexer equipment on the lower front. Although the panel provides a high density arrangement, when compared with conventional cross-connect jack panels, it is still a rather expensive arrangement and only allows access to two circuits at a time. In addition, the panel only provides patch access to one piece of equipment at a time.
One of the principal objects and advantages of this invention is to provide a unique low frequency telecommunication digital network interface cross-connect panel that increases the number (density) of network circuits that may be terminated and cross-connected within a limited space and that is less costly than previous digital interface cross-connect panels, while providing testing, monitoring and patch cross-connect access to all of the circuits all of the time.
An additional object and advantage of this invention is to provide a unique low frequency telecommunication digital network interface cross-connect panel having the ability to handle up to 168 circuits on a standard 23 inch rack self within in a vertical panel space of 6 inches. at a lesser cost.
A further object and advantage of this invention is to provide a unique low frequency telecommunication digital network interface cross-connect panel that is less expensive providing a low cost alternative to conventional digital cross-connect jack panels.
These and other objects and advantages of this invention will become apparent upon reading and understanding the following detailed description of a preferred embodiment.